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Ornstein stretched his arms, satisfied. The stubborn undead had been sent back to the last bonfire she had rested at. Hopefully, she wouldn’t be foolish enough to return for a fresh death, for he knew it was righteous for her to remain in the muck her kind came from.
“No human should be allowed the privilege to set a hand upon the Lordvessel, even if the linking of the first flame requires it.” Ornstein adressed. In return, Smough chuckled.
“Do not give yourself credit only because you were granted a special soul, dragon slayer.”
The knight waved a hand dismissively at the executioner before returning to his position.
He watched over the fog gate shielding the entrance. He hoped, whenever he glared at his cross spear, soaked in blood, that the undead would not be just like many of them . Greedy creatures. Ambitious usurpers searching for a higher power. Those were the worst to deal with.
Or so he hoped.
She kept coming back, for such was her strength of will; as if she expected to appease his resilence with him just having to endure seeing her back on her feet. He did not understand what made her so determined; couldn't she realize this was a losing battle? Two against one, and stronger no doubt. He was secured to protect the Lordvessel with his life, and even though her pathetic performance had been once close to bring him to his knees from incommensurable laughter —something he had not been able to do for years—, he stood up and leapt from the ground, ready to bathe her in crimson as many times as needed. Luckily for him, Smough seemed so willing to keep on his word, though Ornstein considered his company the most unpleasant.
The dragon slayer’s patience began to derail when she threw firebombs at them, albeit uselessly. It was bordering on humiliating. He dug his spear into her skull without much effort, making a macabre mess of torn flesh over the shimmering tiles. Maybe that would teach her a lesson.
At some point he saw her through the fog, carrying her loyal halberd and her shield, and Ornstein shouted aloud, fury seizing him. “Return from where you came!”, before his cross spear skewed her like a fish and more blood dirtied the pure, golden soil. Behind him, Smough’s laugh reverberated the room.
"What do you think it is so funny?" Ornstein growled. He swung the spear in the air threateningly, hoping for Smough to remember who was the one still in charge.
The grotesque helmet hid Smough's expression, but Ornstein had been by his side long enough to aknowledge when the executioner's eyes were creaking with gloat.
"I find it amusing that such a poor human can so easily rile you up, oh great dragon slayer." Smough sneered.
It was embarrassing how, after so long, Smough still could be such an irritating spawn. Ornstein's grip on the spear tightened.
"What is it, Captain? Is your pride hurt?”
He wanted, oh so badly, to throw a lightning bolt at the executioner and to teach him some manners, but the price of captainhood wasn't possible with a lack of virtues such as respect and self-control. The knight turned his back on the executioner, not responding to Smough’s mocking speech that followed next.
The misty door shivered again, giving way to the undead. Ornstein heard Smough chuckle.
“Looks like this game is bound to carry on, huh.”
“Enough.” Ornstein snarled. The undead, who was wearing a helm and scarred robes, had already thrown herself in battle, this time going for Smough, who moved at a slower pace and whose hammer made the room quake under their feet. She was quick and agile, avoiding their attacks a bit esier than before... was she in possession of some kind of ring? He would have to kill her again to find out.
The fight carried on for as long as she allowed it, and to Ornstein's shock, the undead's weapon pierced Smough's armor, and the brute soon plummeted to the ground. Fucking bastard.
She collapsed next, looking for an Estus flask that came out empty. Ornstein walked towards the fallen body of the executioner. He couldn't deny himself the pleasure he felt upon seeing him down with such disgrace. He felt tempted to give a vengeful kick to his side, but he knew better than that. Gently, he reached out and placed his hand upon him, desiring to consumate what was left of Smough's soul.
Something beyond himself made him stop the process; maybe it was the way the undead was writhing on the floor while blood gushed out of her almost exaggeratedly. Or maybe what his ears were hearing.
She was singing.
A sweet, broken voice, weakened from the state she was in. The woman sang in a language the knight could not identify, yet it did not stop him from catching on the despair she was conveying so effortlessly. He removed his hand off Smough's armor, and approached her with hesitation, watching the human from his height as if contemplating an ant he had trampled on. Magic carried the song, and so did her voice. On the upper floor, Gwynevere’s illusion guarded the Lordvessel she so stubbornly had been trying to retrieve. But that voice... It was embracing him like a duvet, and now he no longer stood in an abandoned cathedral in the middle of a deserted city; nor was he wearing his leonine armor. Ornstein, now younger and dressed in light clothing, was walking on a floor of grass. The atmosphere smelled of rain, and a nearby river sounded abundant. The desire to wet his feet into the water, to do something jovial as jumping in and bathing for hours while he stared up the sky, guessing the shapes of the clouds, it was pressing him on. Desires he thought had been buried beneath a mountain of arrogance and loftiness to never unearth them, now emerging with impossible ease. His life as a knight and faithful noble courtier was yet long to come.
Someone called him. His mother. Ornstein ran to the house, and he found the woman sitting by a harpsichord and preparing the score of her favorite song. She smiled warmly.
“Ornstein, do you wish to play?”
The youngster nodded enthusiastically and sat down beside her. He snapped his fingers, making her mother laugh.
“How elegant! Some day you might become a famous musician in this realm. And even if you don’t, I'll always be proud of you. It is all I want you to know.”
Ornstein ran his fingertips over the keys, searching for the notes that would give start to the melody. He soon began to play.
In his childhood dreams, he grew up to became a skilled musician. He was often hired to play in private for the nobility. He would have not believed that he would grow up to become one of the most skillest dragon slayers the world would yet to meet. He would less have believed that Lord Gwyn himself would make him his most trusted knight. So in the meantime, he would keep doing what he most loved, savoring the music and losing himself in the partiture, wishing that one day, perhaps, perhaps—
"I wish..."
Something pierced the flesh of his right foot. The tune ceased.
He was back to reality, in the cold, empty cathedral, his gaze fixed on a floor of red. A dagger had pierced part of his boot until it had sunk deep into his skin and broken the bone. However, despite the pang of pain that subjected him, Ornstein did not scream nor flinch. The knight bent over and, with pursed lips, slowly pulled back the dagger only to realize that the shiny blade had been greased with something green and viscous.
Poison.
The undead dragged herself awkwardly across the floor, fumbling for the last dark sprite of humanity left in her travel bag. When she found it, she caged it in her hand as it tried to squeeze out of her grasp. Her small body absorbed a blinding light, and Ornstein knew his fate was nigh. Something stirred deep, especially when the human stood up and spat at him with disdain, and the sweet, vulnerable voice he had listened to minutes ago sounded as venomous as the substance that was slowly spreading throughout his veins.
"Sooner or later, you'd be lost in this world, like the many of them. Why do you still bother?”
His knees failed, for his body had weakened so abruptly; perhaps he had wanted it that way.
A demon. She was a demon. There was no other explanation about her he could rationally think of.
She pointed at him with the halberd that had accompanied her at all time. "Don't you wish to hold onto that sliver of dignity left in you?"
With his knees on the floor, their heads were at the same level. In spite of everything, his spear was still secured in his hand, and he could still use it in his advance, if he wanted to.
Yet, he did not make an effort to harm her.
Ornstein laid down with his back across the dirtied floor, his breastplate moving up and down with every mouthful of breath he took. He could hear noise coming from behind him, probably the undead, who might have been polishing one of her weapons to behead him with. He was going to die, one way or the other. A quicker death would be fine, but the sound of her voice alone was reason enough for him to delay the outcome. He writhed uncomfortably inside his armor; this was far more humiliating than being forced to endure Smough's taunts. Him, brought down by music, whose lyrics had been sung by a voice that made him feel things he didn't know he yearned for. The sweat on his brow was dripping, and he wanted nothing but to close his eyes and sleep. On the other hand, though, he had terribly missed this.
Surprisingly for him, he didn’t find it strange when his helmet was being slowly pulled off, and cold breeze hit the burnt tissue of his face.
But if he could feel all of that, it was sign that he was still alive.
"You gods, always so stubborn." She kindly said.
Eventually, she let him rest his head on her lap. Gentle fingers raked through his hair, providing him a comfort he silently appreciated. Ornstein blinked drowsily. He couldn’t remember the last time he had allowed someone to touch him like that, if he had at all.
From the position he was in, he could see that she had taken her helmet off as well, but the smile he saw on her face he did not understand. What was she smiling for?
The lyrics of the song remained unknown to him, but the sorrow in the melody did not go unnoticed. She could have been singing to a passing lover. But of course, she was not.
"It's all so quiet now.” She muttered at some point, though he barely heard her. Fingers went to remove the hair that covered part of his face, before warm lips pressed on his forehead. Soon, she carried on with her lullaby, and he kept listening.
He tried to shift his leg, but his soul was progressively dettaching from his own body, all tension dissipating.
“I used to own a garden", Ornstein whispered, dragging out the words. He didn't know why he was baring this information to the woman, but he found he didn't care. "It was warm and... nice. And I saw my mother. She taught me music… she was…”
There was no point on keeping it a secret, even if she was none but a stranger to him.
“I really loved her.”
He found harder and harder to give coherence to his words. His tongue weighed and his voice sounded too tired, too adrift. But her fingers in his hair were a solid comfort he found himself getting lost in.
“How did you do that?" He gestured slightly with his hand, "the visions. Are you a witch?"
The woman's singing paused, only to sush him with a finger. “Relax, dragon slayer. And listen to my song. For this world is a cruel one, indeed.”
Even after the poison had long stopped his heart, and her hand was holding his soul like she owned it, her voice kept the song going on.
And on.
When she rose to her feet, she could still feel his skin on her lips.